Travelling with options closed

This blog summarises the teaching from St Nic’s at Home from Emily on Sunday 29 March.  The reflection questions could either be used individually, in a Core Group or Community. Click here to catch up on the service.

During St Nic’s at Home last Sunday, we thought about what it might look like for us to Travel with Options Closed as we journey with Jesus.  Based on Luke 14:15-35, we saw that Jesus calls us into radical commitment to Him.  He calls us to close off all other options in order to give Him our non-negotiable ‘yes’.  And in this time, where our options are more limited as a society, due to the coronavirus crisis, God is calling us back to this simple question – does Jesus have our yes?  Does Jesus have your yes?

REFLECT: What is God teaching you through the more limited options we are experiencing?

In Luke 14:15-35, Jesus teaches us what saying yes to Him looks like.

Firstly, saying yes to Jesus means being ready.  In the story of the banquet, the guests, who had once said yes to the invitation, gave their excuses when the banquet was ready.  The party was ready, but the guests were not – their priorities lay elsewhere.  When we say yes to Jesus’ invite, we are called to live in a state of readiness – ready to close off other options in order to be alert and attentive to Jesus.

REFLECT: What excuses are you most prone to make?  What does it look like to live in a state of readiness?

Secondly, saying yes to Jesus means caring for the least.  After the guests had all made their excuses, the master told his servant to instead go and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame – all those who were marginalised in society.  In Matthew 25, Jesus says: ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me’.  Saying yes to Jesus goes hand in hand with caring for the least, just like the master does in our story.  When we follow Jesus, we close ourselves off to the option of not caring for the least.

REFLECT: How have you cared for the least this week?

Thirdly, saying yes to Jesus means forsaking all others.  In v26, Jesus says that his followers are to hate their father, mother and other relatives – a message that seems at odds with what we’ve just heard!  And yet, when we dig a little bit deeper, we see that he’s not really telling us to hate or disown our family, instead, Jesus is calling us to prioritise Himself, to hate our family, and even our own lives, in comparison to our love for Jesus.  Jesus calls us to ongoingly put Him above and before everyone and everything – He asks for our continual daily ‘yes’, and this might mean saying ‘no’ to other things.

REFLECT: How have you done at giving Jesus your daily ‘yes’ this week?  When was the last time you said ‘no’ to something, in order to say ‘yes’ to Jesus?

Finally, saying yes to Jesus means knowing the cost.  In v22 Jesus says ‘those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.’  William Taylor says, ‘if we are not willing to let Jesus be Lord of all our life, then he is not our Lord at all’.  There is no small print when it comes to following Jesus, and in v28-33 Jesus encourages us to responsibly count the cost of the radical commitment that He asks of us.

REFLECT: Are you willing to let Jesus be Lord of all your life?  Where are you not?  How are you taking responsibility and ownership for your faith?

There’s much in this passage that we need to go away and chew over.  When we travel with Jesus, our options areclosed because He calls us to give him our non-negotiable ‘yes’ and this can feel hard and difficult.  As we journey through the coronavirus crisis, where our options as a society are more closed, let’s ask God to use this time to show us more of what it means to give Jesus our non-negotiable yes.

And, because of Jesus’ yes to us, we can be sure that one day we will take our place at the most beautiful of banquets.  There will be a day when we will be wholly sure that every yes we said to Jesus was a thousand times worth it; a day when we will see the fruit of every yes we ever said to the marginalised and broken for the sake of His name.  There will be a day when we will be 100% confident of the ‘no’s we said in order to say yes to Him, and we will know that the cost of following Jesus in this life was so small and insignificant in comparison to the riches that we have found in Him for eternity.

REFLECT: How does our future hope shape your yes to Jesus in the present?

So, today and every day, as you walk with Jesus, are you willing to travel with closed options?  Does Jesus have your yes?